THE WOODS WERE LOVELY, DARK, AND DEEP, but it seemed like the group had miles to go before they encountered a potential gate to an alternate dimension. Amara had long since cycled through both water bottles she'd brought along for the trip, her muscles aching and a stitch in her side from overexertion. And she was far from the only one in their party tempted to call it quits until they had a better plan – at this point, Dustin was the sole individual with a skip in his step.

At some point throughout the journey Amara had gravitated toward Eddie, who despite swallowing his fears and choosing to go ahead with Dustin's hunch remained tetchy, repeatedly glancing over his shoulder like Jason was shrouded in the darkness and waiting to strike. Lucas and Max had stuck close to one another for most of the duration, communicating in hushed whispers and shoulders brushing; Dustin led the group with his gaze fixed on his trusty compass, Steve repeatedly reminding him to keep his eyes in front of him before he tripped; Nancy kept to herself, silent with worry for her brother and her boyfriend but simultaneously thankful they were anywhere but with them; Robin and Shaelynn were all subtle glances and smiles when their eyes met, so adorable to Amara that it was peculiar to think they were strangers only last week.

Amara let her mind wander to her family, whom she hadn't seen in days even if they knew the truth this time around. She was too far removed to know whether Patrick's murder had changed anything, the scope of the backlash Eurydice was undoubtedly on the receiving end of due to her insistence that Eddie was innocent even after he had ostensibly killed a third time, if Scott still had ahold of his job at the dealership, if Kevin had caught wind of anything given that the recent events had likely reached outside of Hawkins by now. It meant so much to her that they believed that her friend was innocent and were willing to fight for him, just as they had done for her all her life, but it pained her that they were risking their safety in the process.

Eddie seemed to share a similar sentiment. "Hey, I just wanted to thank you," he broke the silence between them with a quiet whisper, his hands stuffed into his pockets. "On behalf of your mom, I mean," he added in response to Amara's confusion. "I guess it's easier to blame the person everyone else assumes is guilty, so it really means a lot that she went to such great lengths to defend me. Even if it's all for nothing now."

"It's like I said. My mom isn't one to back down from a fight," Amara smiled warmly. "She knew that if I believed you were innocent that it had to be true, that staying silent was the same as agreeing with everyone else. And she isn't the only one – your uncle's on your side as well. Plenty of people are."

"Yeah, but that was before Patrick died and I ran away again," Eddie disputed, shaking his head fiercely. "I ran like I always do and now everyone's bound to think I'm a psycho murderer on top of the town freak. If I hadn't run – "

"Jason would've killed you, Eddie," Amara interrupted sharply, the quaver of her voice a slight shock to him. "He saw what it was easiest to believe and to make matters worse it's his girlfriend and best friend who died. As much as I hate to say it, he's too far gone at this point – nothing we say is gonna convince him you're innocent, not when he's more likely to think that Shaelynn's helping you than he's wrong. You were right to run."

"Or I could've turned myself in after Chrissy died. It would've made things so much easier," Eddie countered. Amara didn't say anything in response, recognizing that Eddie was going down the rabbit hole as she had done so many times before. For someone wanted for murder on three counts, she was amazed that he had held it together enough to look out for his own survival. "Sure, they could've jailed me but then they would've realized that I couldn't possibly be murdering people from prison. Running away only guaranteed that I'd be the main suspect."

"It's what anyone would've done. Myself included," Amara articulated, keeping her voice steady. "You saw the unexplainable; someone levitated on her own and died for no rhyme or reason, and you ran because you knew you were the only person in the vicinity. You ran because you knew that if you stayed put you'd be in jail before you could explain yourself, and because a part of you thought that you might be next."

"You're right. I did," Eddie admitted. By now they were trekking downhill, light from their flashlights bouncing off the banded lines of trees. "But that just makes it worse. I had a choice to face the consequences or save my own skin, and I took the coward's way out, just like I did yesterday. You guys have fought monsters and I keep running from angry people. I'm the wimp here."

"Fighting monsters isn't an easy business. I wouldn't recommend it," Amara replied rather nonchalantly for someone inching closer to facing down Vecna with every footstep. "On the other hand... with monsters there's reassurance in knowing that they don't stand for anything other than destruction. People are far more complicated – you wish you could feel sympathy for them because they have legitimate grounds for being angry, but they're too blinded by their own prejudice to listen to reason. I'd take monsters any day over people like that. I would."

"Fair point," Eddie capitulated, idly wondering how much of what she'd said was based on personal experience. He knew that she was far from popular, her hobbies and choice of friends notable indications, but people didn't make fun of her the way they did with him and other members of Hellfire. Still, she had to have had her fair share of humiliation to empathize with someone like him, or so Eddie was convinced. "Are you always this goddamn stubborn?"

"Only when my friends keep beating themselves up over things they can't control," Amara jested, eliciting a chuckle from Eddie. Her facial expression quickly shifted into contemplation though. "But also because I've had plenty of accusations leveled against me. I was the town freak of my old neighborhood – people didn't accuse me of murder per se, but my neighbors would whisper that it was only a matter of time before I did simply because I didn't know how to properly express my emotions, that I was a psychopath who couldn't feel anything. It was a real self-esteem booster."

"Jesus Christ," Eddie muttered, dragging a hand across his forehead. So that was why Amara was so sympathetic to his predicament; he understood she wasn't telling him the full story, merely enough for him to grasp that she knew all too well what it was like to be the outcast. That everyone in their group had something that gave society an excuse to toss them aside, just like him. "We're a pair, aren't we?"

"I guess you could say that," Amara replied thoughtfully, stunned that she had felt comfortable enough to disclose components of her autism to both Shaelynn and Eddie without them judging her for it. "I knew I couldn't change who I was, so when I moved here I tried to hide who I was. It took fighting monsters for me to realize that the only opinion of myself that mattered was my own, but I still haven't been comfortable enough to put myself out there. At least, not to the extent that you do."

"I wouldn't recommend it or anything," Eddie advised, taking note of Dustin quickening his pace for reasons unbeknownst to him. They were definitely off the map by now, their only sense of direction the fact that the needle of Dustin's compass remained pointed forward. "If anything I should take a page out of your playbook."

"Don't. It's not worth it," Amara responded fiercely. There were moments when she'd lie awake at night and wonder how much she had missed out on from hiding away, and she had to remind herself that overcoming her fears at all had been worth the risk no matter how long it had taken her. Nothing good could come out of ruminating about things she couldn't change. "I've always secretly envied you, y'know? You're constantly looked down upon just for being who you are and loving the things you love, and through it all you've never stopped being you, even when your life is on the line. No matter what happens, don't let anyone take that from you, okay?"

"If you insist," Eddie relented, a hint of a grin shining through. "But the same goes for you, alright?"

If Amara had at one point harbored any leftover instinct to go back into a life of hiding, it was nothing but a distant memory by now. "You can hold me to it," she vowed.

"Something's happening!" Dustin exclaimed from the head of the pack, prompting Amara and Eddie to refocus their attention on the mission at hand. The aforementioned boy had halted in his tracks for a millisecond before taking off again, eager that their hours of aimless trekking had paid off.

"Dustin?" Eddie tore after his friend, not keen to lose him in the dark. "Can you slow down? Dustin?"

"I think we're getting close!" Dustin assured the group, paying no mind to where he was going or that they were finally out of the woods. But Shaelynn did, and she noticed what Dustin hadn't – that he was bound to catapult into the lake where Vecna had murdered Patrick less than twenty-four hours ago.

Eddie reacted before she could, seizing Dustin around the torso before he lost his balance. "Watch your step, big guy."

"Oh man," Steve let out, sharing a nervous glance with Amara as they took in the familiarity of the place they'd spent many a night at. "You've gotta be shitting me."

"Yeah," Eddie sighed, wondering how he hadn't paid any mind to which direction they'd been heading all this time. "I thought these woods were familiar."

"Lover's Lake," Robin breathed, her eyes unwittingly falling on Shaelynn. The girl, who had been staring at the water she'd been submerged in yesterday, seemed to soften once she felt Robin's gaze, linking their fingers while continuing to face forward. No one else noticed.

"This is confounding," Dustin admitted, unable to rationalize how or why a gate had materialized in the most arbitrary location possible.

"There's a gate in Lover's Lake?" Max questioned, taking note to stay as far back from the lakeshore as she could. If Patrick's death proved anything, it was that music wouldn't protect her there.

"It's where Patrick was murdered, wasn't it?" Shaelynn brought up warily. "Between him and the lights exploding... I'd say there's a connection there."

"Whenever the Demogorgon attacked, it left an opening," Nancy recalled, glancing at Amara for confirmation. "Maybe Vecna's the same way."

"Guess there's only one way to know for sure," Amara resolved, conscious that they had no choice but to move forward with their search.

Eddie had concealed his boat by the shoreline in his haste to escape, well hidden enough that no one had unearthed it between then and now. He removed the tarp and with Steve's assistance thrust it into the lake rather harshly; the impact of the boat against the water made Amara wince at the potential that it could alert others to their location, but they appeared safe at least for now. Steve and Eddie held the boat in place for their companions to climb aboard, though taking into account the size and weight of the boat some of them would have to stay behind.

Steve offered his hand to Robin, who was first in line, but she instead opted to use his and Eddie's heads for support. "Yeah, I'm just gonna do that," she muttered, stumbling to the end of the boat once she let go. "Thank you."

"Yeah, that works too," Steve rolled his eyes in amusement at what was so characteristically Robin of her.

Eddie clambered into the boat next, positioning himself beside Robin. He held out his hand for Nancy to grasp, which she took with a grateful smile before joining them. As if to make up for Robin using his head as leverage, Amara accepted Steve's hand and got in as well. At this rate they only had room for one more person, not that Dustin had considered that – he saluted Shaelynn and Max, who appeared perfectly content with staying behind, but Eddie intercepted him before he could get more than one foot in.

"Hey, hey, hey, you trying to sink us?" he protested, batting Dustin's hat. "This thing holds four people tops, okay?"

"It's better this way, okay?" Nancy insisted, taking note of Dustin's scowl at being left out of the thing he'd endeavored for hours to find. "You guys stay here with Max and Shaelynn. Keep an eye out for trouble."

"You keep an eye out!" Dustin retorted. Nancy narrowed her eyes as if to challenge him, but he merely doubled down and mimicked her expression. "It's my goddamn theory!"

"You heard Nance," Robin chimed in, highly amused by the whole ordeal.

Dustin looked betrayed. "Who put her in charge?"

"I did," Robin replied easily. Amara scarcely concealed her laughter with her hand; apparently she wasn't subtle enough, for Dustin pouted at her as well.

"Welcome to the losers club, Dustin," Shaelynn had nabbed Dustin's compass while he'd been distracted, the final push for him to release an aggravated sigh and stalk in the direction of Lucas and Max. Shaelynn handed Nancy the device, her face awash with worry at the fact that they were splitting up. "Don't do anything rash, okay? I can't... I can't lose anyone else."

"Don't worry, we'll come right back if we find a gate," Amara reassured her. "We might be stupid, but we're not that stupid."

"Right. For you guys it's just another Wednesday," Shaelynn managed a grin, though it was fleeting. "Good luck out there."

"Same to you," Robin piped up, beyond thankful that the darkness concealed the tint of her cheeks. God, she was pathetic. "Not that you'll need it, of course, but you know what the kids are like."

Shaelynn locked eyes with Robin, hers glittering with something unfathomable. "I'm pretty sure I do."

        "Hey!"

Steve let Dustin have the last word and propelled the boat into the water. But he had no intention of staying behind in the event that they had to venture underwater, which he and his savior complex had already decided he was the candidate for. The others in the boat didn't appear to bat an eye as he settled himself beside Amara, having expected him to come onboard – even the boat itself conceded that it would have to contend with more passengers than normal, adjusting to the weight after a few precarious swings.

Dustin seemingly couldn't accept what a boat could. "You said four!" he yelped petulantly.

"Sorry," Steve responded hastily, shooting Dustin a wave goodbye.

"Bedtime at nine, kiddos!" Robin chortled as they drifted away from the shore, the distance between them and their friends widening with every passing second. Dustin waved his middle finger at them in annoyance; as if to further get under his skin, Robin stood up and brandished her arm in his direction. "Miss you already!"

"Miss you too!" Shaelynn hollered back much to Dustin's chagrin. He was the only one out of them unsatisfied with the whole arrangement, after all. But she meant it completely when she added, "Stay safe!"

(They wouldn't)

Eddie and Robin continued to row the boat in the direction that the compass specified, and Amara attempted to distract herself by admiring the beauty of Lover's Lake. The sky was overcast with clouds that reflected upon the surface of the water, framed by trees that had existed before them and would outlive all of them. It had always been her and Steve's place, but it hit her that it was now tainted by Patrick's murder and possibly a gate to an alternate dimension. She didn't know how she could disjoin the two.

Maybe distracting herself wasn't working. So she instead tangled her fingers with Steve's, and he squeezed them to let her know that he was feeling a similar way. She didn't even need to ask.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down. Slow down, guys," Nancy instructed Robin and Eddie out of the blue. They did so and joined Steve and Amara in peering over the compass, which was rotating erratically after hours of remaining steadfast. If there was any proof that the gate was underwater, that had to be it.

"Well, that isn't something you see every day," Amara remarked wryly.

"Guys, what's going on?" Dustin radioed them, having noticed that they were no longer moving. "Come on guys, talk to me. What's going on?"

"Uh, Dustin, your – your compass has gone from wonky to wonky with a capital 'aah,'" Robin relayed, cringing at her choice of words. A giggle that sounded suspiciously like Shaelynn's resonated from the other end, causing Amara to smirk at her best friend; Robin fake scowled at her in return.

Amara was suddenly all too aware that Steve's hand was no longer in hers. Pivoting to her left, she found that he had removed his shoes and was in the process of taking off his socks. Amara had an inkling as to what he planned to do, a plan she was tempted to stop him from going ahead with, but she couldn't rack her brain for any other method to verify that there was indeed a gate below them.

"Steve, what are you doing?" Nancy questioned, not catching on as Amara had.

"Somebody's gotta go down there and check this thing out," Steve rationalized. Somehow, hearing him say it out loud did no justice for Amara's apprehension that the operation could go awry. "Unless one of you four can top being a Hawkins High swim co-captain and a certified lifeguard for three years, then... it's gotta be me. No complaints, all right?"

"Hey, I'm not complaining," Eddie muttered, sparing a frightful glance at the water he'd spent hours trying to shake off. "I do not wanna go down there."

Steve had positioned himself on the rim of the boat, careful not to capsize it. He shed his yellow sweater and turned halfway, tossing it to Amara – she instinctively caught it, like it was a piece of him she could hold onto until he came back. Eddie had bagged one of their flashlights and was waiting to hand it to him, but all of Steve's attention was focused on his girlfriend, who was rightfully nervous for his safety given his track record.

"You're not gonna talk me out of it?" Steve entertained, his eyes full of adoration for the girl who had stuck by him at every turn, even when he believed he didn't deserve it.

"What would that accomplish?" Amara tilted her head amusedly, knowing that if it were the other way around Steve would be as short of luck at persuading her. "Do what you have to do. Just be careful, please."

"I will," Steve promised. Amara beamed in response, fervently ignoring that Robin was now smirking due to her boyfriend's shirtless state. Sure, Steve was a rather attractive sight without a shirt on, but Amara had bandaged his abdomen one too many times to lose her composure every instance, especially when he was asking to be patched up again.

"Hey," Eddie directed Steve's attention to him, his voice muffled from the cigarette box clenched between his teeth. Steve accepted the flashlight from him and readied himself to descend into the chilly waters; when he closed his eyes he could almost picture the pool at Hawkins High, or his own backyard pool he could barely look at anymore from being unable to disassociate it with Barb's death. But here he was, not the co-captain of a team that had gone its separate ways or responsible for the murder of a girl he barely knew but still missed, but willing to put his life on the line if it meant sparing any other families from the unthinkable. "Good luck."

"Thanks," Steve breathed.

Meanwhile, Eddie had nestled a cigarette in his mouth and was about to light it, only for Robin to snatch it out of his hand and toss it into the water. "Gross," she admonished.

"Hey, Steve?" Amara piped up as he was drawing in steady breaths, preparing himself for anything he might find beneath the surface. Her tentative smile gave him the dose of confidence he needed, because she had always believed in him even when he himself didn't. "Come back to me, okay?"

"I always will," Steve vowed. And with that, he dove into the lake.

Amara and the others held the boat in place to withstand the impact of the dive, and once it had subsided she peered over the rim. Steve's flashlight was her only guiding light, and soon enough she couldn't see it anymore. She gripped the edge of the boat to calm her nerves, trusting Steve to find the gate and get back to them. But she couldn't escape the potential that something could go terribly wrong.

She momentarily withdrew her gaze from the water only to find Robin with a shit-eating grin plastered to their face, and Nancy with similar, albeit subdued amusement. How they could remain so calm, even cheerful when they were in such a perilous standing was beyond her, but then she recalled Steve's discarded shirt in her possession.

"What?" she shrugged her shoulders, not understanding their dramatics. "You guys act like I've never seen Steve shirtless before."

The double meaning of her words hit her the second they left her mouth – Robin's eyes bulged, Nancy cringed in mortification, and even Eddie, who wasn't in their conversation, choked on the cigarette he'd lit while Robin was otherwise occupied. Her cheeks burning as bright as Max's hair, Amara protested, "No, no, no, no, no! Not like that – we haven't – " she gave up and buried her head in her hands, regretting saying anything at all. "God, this is so embarrassing."

"I'll say," Eddie chortled, yanking his cigarette out of Robin's reach before she could doom it to the same fate as its predecessor. "And here I was thinking you weren't as innocent as I thought."

"To be fair, I don't think anyone would be innocent after three year's worth of battling interdimensional monsters," Amara contended, yanking her sweater tighter around her figure and wishing she'd brought along a jacket if she'd known she'd be out so late. "At this rate we're all gonna need therapy after this."

"Bold statement, seeing as there's a chance we won't survive this time," Robin remarked dryly. She glimpsed at Nancy, who was keeping watch on how long Steve had been underwater for. "Where we at, Wheeler?"

"Closing in on a minute," Nancy informed them.

"Okay," Amara responded, biting her lip anxiously. Steve really was their best bet at scouting for a gate as any of them would've had to come up for air by now, but she didn't know if even that was enough. The four of them didn't make conversation from there, awaiting the moment Steve broke the surface and relayed to them his finding.

When he did it was so abrupt that Amara actually jumped, gasping in concurrency with her friends as Steve took in lungfuls of air. Once she had gotten over the shock, she exhaled in relief at the fact that he was okay, that he had kept his promise to her. What their next steps were now that Steve had evidently found the gate were of little concern to Amara; it could wait until he had dried and they had reconvened with their friends on the lakeshore first.

"I found it," Steve gasped, treading in place.

"You did?" Amara confirmed.

"I found it. Yeah. I found it," Steve respired, inching forward until he was grasping the perimeter of the boat, proud of his work.

Robin, still equipped with the walkie-talkie, brought it to her mouth. "Dustin, you are a goddamn Einstein," she enthused, any trace of annoyance at him for dragging them through the woods for hours on end long gone. "Steve found the gate."

"It's pretty wild," Steve detailed, accepting Amara's outstretched hand as she made to hoist him back into the boat, all of them unaware of what was transpiring on the shoreline, far beyond their field of vision. "It's more of a snack-size gate than the mama gate, but still, it's pretty damn big."

Before any of them could comment on Steve's revelation, he vanished beneath the surface. Amara managed to hold onto him and he quickly reappeared, confusion etched on his face as he cast an uneasy glimpse at the water, unable to discern what had tried to pull him down through the murky depths. But then it happened again, and this time Amara wasn't fast enough.

        "Steve!" Amara screamed, her heart feeling like it was going to beat out of her chest. How foolish were they to think that they could go looking for a gate without the Upside Down taking advantage of their closeness? Steve had been brave enough to volunteer, and the Upside Down wasn't going to let the rest of them get away without collateral damage.

"Steve! Steve!" Nancy and Robin shrieked, shaking with worry for their friend. Amara had gone silent as she pondered what her boyfriend could be enduring on the other side, and, more prominently, what would happen if she did nothing.

"No! No! No!" Eddie screeched, cigarette long forgotten in favor of a boy he had never particularly liked but admired for his heroism when the former was the embodiment of a coward. "What the hell was that, man?"

"Steve! Amara, what happened?"

"Jesus!"

As soon as she saw air bubbles ascend to the surface, Amara had made up her mind. Because not even her friends' insistence that she stay behind could take away the notion that Steve would do it for her, for any of them. Every hero needed someone to catch them when they fell, and just as Amara had risked her life to save Steve from the Demodogs at the junkyard, from Billy when he could no longer fight back, and from the Russian bunker when he could barely put one foot in front of the other, Amara was more than willing to step foot in the Upside Down if it meant saving her best friend.

"No, Amara!"

"Amara!"

Ignoring her friends as well as her cells begging her to stay above water, Amara plunged beneath the surface and followed the sound of Steve's screams.

published to quotev: 8/30/24
published to wattpad: 5/3/25